Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov. 19
By Temkin Jafarov - Trend:
Azerbaijan and Iran have discussed the financing of the Qazvin-Rasht-Astara railway project, deputy head of Iran's State Company for Construction and Development of Transportation Infrastructure Hussein Nazdar said, Mehr News agency reported on Nov.19.
According to the statement, he said that a meeting held in the city of Rasht was attended by the Azerbaijani Ambassador to Iran Javanshir Akhundov, the representative of Azerbaijan Railways JSC and other officials.
"The meeting mainly discussed the form of Azerbaijan's participation in the financing of the Qazvin-Rasht-Astara railway," Nazdar said.
It should be stressed that Iran's officials said that the Qazvin - Rasht- Astara railway will be constructed in March 2014. The rail route is complex and includes 22 tunnels and 15 special bridges. Around 70 per cent of the work for the construction of 15 tunnels has been completed.
It should be recalled that the Qazvin - Rasht- Astara railway is part of 'North -South' transport corridor and is being constructed by Azerbaijan, Russia and Iran.
A $400 million investment is planned to be made in the construction work. It is predicted that the trade corridor will hit six million tons at the first stage and 15-20 million tons in the future.